There was another pause, and Granice, with a vague
underlying sense of amusement, saw his guest’s
look change from pleasantry to apprehension.

“What’s the joke, my dear fellow?
I fail to see.”

“It’s not a joke. It’s the
truth. I murdered him.” He had spoken
painfully at first, as if there were a knot in his
throat; but each time he repeated the words he found
they were easier to say.

Ascham laid down his extinct cigar.

“What’s the matter? Aren’t
you well? What on earth are you driving at?”

“I’m perfectly well. But I murdered
my cousin, Joseph Lenman, and I want it known that
I murdered him.”

“You want it known?”

“Yes. That’s why I sent for you.
I’m sick of living, and when I try to kill myself
I funk it.” He spoke quite naturally now,
as if the knot in his throat had been untied.

“Good Lord—­good Lord,” the
lawyer gasped.

“But I suppose,” Granice continued, “there’s
no doubt this would be murder in the first degree?
I’m sure of the chair if I own up?”

Ascham drew a long breath; then he said slowly:
“Sit down, Granice. Let’s talk.”

II

GRANICE told his story simply, connectedly.

He began by a quick survey of his early years—­the
years of drudgery and privation. His father,
a charming man who could never say “no,”
had so signally failed to say it on certain essential
occasions that when he died he left an illegitimate
family and a mortgaged estate. His lawful kin
found themselves hanging over a gulf of debt, and
young Granice, to support his mother and sister, had
to leave Harvard and bury himself at eighteen in a
broker’s office. He loathed his work, and
he was always poor, always worried and in ill-health.
A few years later his mother died, but his sister,
an ineffectual neurasthenic, remained on his hands.
His own health gave out, and he had to go away for
six months, and work harder than ever when he came
back. He had no knack for business, no head for
figures, no dimmest insight into the mysteries of commerce.
He wanted to travel and write—­those were
his inmost longings. And as the years dragged
on, and he neared middle-age without making any more
money, or acquiring any firmer health, a sick despair
possessed him. He tried writing, but he always
came home from the office so tired that his brain
could not work. For half the year he did not
reach his dim up-town flat till after dark, and could
only “brush up” for dinner, and afterward
lie on the lounge with his pipe, while his sister
droned through the evening paper. Sometimes he
spent an evening at the theatre; or he dined out,
or, more rarely, strayed off with an acquaintance
or two in quest of what is known as “pleasure.”
And in summer, when he and Kate went to the sea-side
for a month, he dozed through the days in utter weariness.
Once he fell in love with a charming girl—­but
what had he to offer her, in God’s name?
She seemed to like him, and in common decency he had
to drop out of the running. Apparently no one
replaced him, for she never married, but grew stoutish,
grayish, philanthropic—­yet how sweet she
had been when he had first kissed her! One more
wasted life, he reflected...